The nation’s highest court paved the way for President Donald Trump to deport hundreds of thousands of immigrants from Haiti and Syria fleeing instability and violence in their home countries in a case about their deportation protections under temporary protected status.

In a 6-3 decision, the justices said the federal law is clear in that it prohibits judges to review executive-branch decisions about TPS that are unrelated to constitutional claims. It also said that the arguments that the Trump administration was terminating TPS because of race, violating the Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause, “is unlikely to succeed on the merits.”

“Respondents and the courts below offer no sound theories to overcome the plain meaning of the judicial-review bar. Respondents’ argument that the (TPS law) applies only to substantive claims, not those based on alleged procedural errors, finds no support in the statutory language,” reads a summary of the majority opinion, authored by Justice Samuel Alito.

“Reversed and remanded,” states the ruling, meaning that federal judges’ orders upholding the protections were struck down and that the case was sent back to the lower courts.

The Supreme Court’s decision deals a devastating blow to beneficiaries of TPS holders in South Florida, the heart of the Haitian community in the United States. Over a third of all TPS holders from Haiti live and work in the Sunshine State. It leaves them, along with about 6,000 Syrians nationwide, without deportation protections or work permits and vulnerable to immigration detention. It also comes less than a week after internal documents show DHS did not follow federal law because it did not consult with the State Department before terminating Haiti’s TPS.

The ruling is a major victory for the Trump administration, whose mass-deportation agenda has relied on stripping hundreds of thousands of immigrants of their legal statuses. It could pave the way for the Trump administration to end TPS without judicial review for a slew of other countries as well.

The administration has already rounded up hundreds of former TPS holders from Venezuela, which already lost TPS protections in a Supreme Court emergency ruling while lower-court litigation is pending. It also recently deported a TPS holder who had lived in Florida for over 20 years from the Florida Keys to Haiti. Shortly after, he returned to the U.S. because his deportation was illegal.

In a statement to the Miami Herald, James Percival, the Department of Homeland Security’s general counsel celebrated the decision, saying that “The T in TPS stands for TEMPORARY, yet many of these designations became de facto amnesty. This is a win for the rule of law and common sense.”

Meanwhile, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, whose state has the largest population of TPS holders in the country, called it the “correct decision.”

Ira Kurzban, whose law firm is among those representing Haitian plaintiffs in the Supreme Court case, called the case “trouble on a lot of different levels.” He told the Herald that the majority opinion, which Justice Amy Coney Barrett, the mother of two adopted kids from Haiti joined, showed how the justices read presidential power to be supreme over most actions. “What they’re doing is diminishing the rule of law by diminishing the power of Courts oversight over gross misfeasance by the executive branch,” said the veteran Miami attorney.

Geoffrey Pipoly, an attorney who argued in the Supreme Court on behalf of Haitians, said his team was reviewing the decision and evaluating next steps. He said the decision meant that the Trump administration can now “break the law flagrantly and openly and make no secret of it and the federal courts can’t stop it.” He added that the most surprising aspect of the decision was that it did not conclude that Trump’s comments were based on racial discrimination. The majority opinion says “none of the cited statements either by the President or the Secretary was overtly racial.”

Trump has said falsely that Haitians eat dogs and cats, including during a visit to South Florida. He has also said Haitians “all have AIDS” and has called Haiti a “s***hole” country, among other remarks.

“The majority put blinders on to the evidence, and I think their outcome, like the government’s outcome, was preordained,” said Pipoly.

Strong dissent

Justice Elena Kegan wrote the dissenting opinion, saying that to “preclude review of those determinations is of course to insulate critical matters from judicial scrutiny.” Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson also dissented. Kagan also wrote that the argument that race had likely entered into the decision-making was likely to succeed.

“The statements fairly shout, in their racial undertones and overtones alike, that race entered into the President’s resolve to remove Haitians from this country,” wrote Kagan, adding that TPS holders from Syria and Haiti should be allowed to stay while litigating their cases.

They “should not instead be consigned to devastating, and indeed life- threatening injury,” wrote Kagan.

The TPS Supreme Court ruling stems from emergency requests that the Trump administration made to the court asking for the justices to end the protections for Haiti after lower courts ruled in favor of TPS holders. In one of those courts, Judge Ana Reyes, who is on the district court in Washington, D.C., said the comments from Noem about Haitians showed prejudice.

In its emergency request, the Department of Justice argued that the lower courts were overreaching their authority. The Supreme Court consolidated that emergency request with another for ending protections for Syria, which has about 4,000 TPS holders living in the United States. The court heard arguments in April.

The Trump administration first ended TPS for Haiti in February 2025, around the same time it also did for Venezuela. The Department of Homeland Security, then under Noem, argued that conditions in Haiti were safe enough for its nationals living in the United States to return despite ongoing extreme violence, widespread hunger and political instability. At the same time, the Department of State has said American travelers should not go to Haiti and is also part of the deployment of an international task force sent to suppress gangs in Haiti.

The United Nations estimates that up to 90% of Port-au-Prince is controlled by gangs and that gang violence has killed over 2,300 people in Haiti since the beginning of this year. Haiti first received TPS in 2010 during the Obama administration after an earthquake that the Haitian government estimates killed over 300,000 people.

No TPS for Venezuela

Other countries whose nationals still hold TPS under lower-court orders in pending litigation include Burma, Ethiopia, South Sudan and Yemen. The Supreme Court ruling Thursday could change the course of those cases.

This is the third time the Supreme Court rules on TPS during the Trump administration. Last year, it allowed the federal government to end TPS for over half a million Venezuelans.

On Wednesday, major back-to-back earthquakes struck Venezuela, killing at least 188 people and injuring hundreds of others. Buildings in the capital of Caracas collapsed, and there was significant damage in several north-central Venezuelan states, including La Guaira. Thousands are feared to be trapped under the rubble as rescue and recovery efforts are ongoing.

The natural disaster exacerbates the ongoing humanitarian and political crises. Natural disasters such as earthquakes are one of the reasons DHS can grant TPS, and questions abound whether Trump will continue to deport people following the devastating seismic activity.

Jose Palma, spokesman of the National TPS Alliance, said in a statement that while the decision “harms communities and families in real and unnecessary ways ... we will not stop fighting for equal rights.”

Another consequential ruling

On Thursday, the Supreme Court also ruled that federal law “neither entitles an alien standing in Mexico to apply for asylum nor requires an immigration officer to inspect him.” Both decisions come days after the Supreme Court also held that border authorities don’t need “clear and convincing evidence” of crimes committed by green card holders to prevent them from entering the United States on their green cards.

Percival, the DHS general counsel, celebrated the decisions as “victories for the rule of law and common sense.” Immigration advocates say the asylum ruling allows the Trump administration to turn away immigrants seeking asylum at ports of entry and will radically reshape access to asylum, and that the other decision violates due process rights of permanent residents.

Sotomayor penned the dissent, writing that the asylum ruling “blesses the Executive Branch’s decision to slam the door shut on all who are fleeing persecution, despite the detailed inspection and asylum system that Congress enacted and commands. She was joined by Kagan and Jackson in this opinion as well.

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